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Thanh Nguyen’s friends tell 9NEWS she has a spinal injury, broken bones and had some internal bleeding.
DENVER — A Denver teacher will start the school year on the mend after a suspected drunk driver hit her and her fiancé last Friday night. The crash happened near E 104th Avenue and McKay Road in Thornton.
Friends of ninth grade English teacher Thanh Nguyen tell 9NEWS she and her fiancé were seriously hurt. Nguyen would have been entering her third year of teaching at Lincoln High School next week; instead, she will be on the mend.
“Students would say she’s a strict teacher, but she’s warm,” her colleague at Lincoln, Kathleen Frank, said. “She’s the best of both worlds, and that’s so hard to find. She’s just totally irreplaceable, but we understand her priority now needs to be on healing.”
On Aug. 9, on McKay Road in Thornton, Nguyen and her fiancé were hit head-on. Thornton Police suspect the driver who did it was drunk when they crossed over the double line. That driver died.
Nguyen and her fiancé were rushed to the hospital, where she remains. Her friends said she had a spinal injury, broken bones and some internal bleeding.
When she got out of her first surgery, she called Frank.
“She was panicking because she was realizing that she wasn’t going to be there for the first day of school,” Frank explained. “Obviously, I said don’t worry, don’t worry, your primary focus is on healing so you can be healthy again.”
Since the crash, Frank organized a GoFundMe to help with some of the medical bills. While some have donated cash, others can only afford a kind gesture.
“One little boy said he would be waiting to carry her books into the school this year,” Frank added. “[The students will] be doing whatever they can to help her.”
Frank said Nguyen was expected to have spinal surgery on Wednesday afternoon. She hopes everyone takes away something from this difficult situation.
“So, I think the lesson in this is in the worst of times we lean on community support, and we all need each other to get through these terrible times,” she said.
Nguyen’s fiancé broke both of his legs during the crash, but that doesn’t stop him from getting an Uber to sit by her side. Frank said the pair’s wedding is still on for next year.
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